


At the Beginning

by thilesluna



Category: Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, FAHC, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-25
Updated: 2016-05-25
Packaged: 2018-06-10 13:51:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6959242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thilesluna/pseuds/thilesluna
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jeremy isn't from Los Santos. He was somewhere else first. Just like everyone else in this city.</p>
            </blockquote>





	At the Beginning

“Oi, Lil J,” Gavin laughs. “Where the hell did you learn to do that?”

Jeremy folds his legs back down and gracefully gets out of his handstand. “High school,” he says, grinning. “I did gymnastics after school at the local YMCA sometimes.”

“Are you serious?” Michael asks and Geoff is wheezing, his laughter filling the penthouse and Jeremy feels warmth spread through his chest. It feels like home.

“Yep,” he says. “There was this girl…”

“Of course there was,” Jack says. She’s smiling as she plays with her beer bottle. “There always is.”

Jeremy laughs. “There was this girl,” he repeats, “and I totally wanted to bang her and her boyfriend and they were both on the school team.”

Gavin does a spit-take, his beer going all over the side of Michael’s head. Michael pushes him off the couch with a ‘What the fuck, dude’ and Geoff laughs harder. Ryan chuckles from where he’s sitting at Jack’s feet.

Jeremy smiles because it feels good to have this, to be able to sit around with friends—with his _crew_ —and just mess around. They just finished a heist that went surprisingly well considering how their heists normally go. There was even a story about the infamous Fake AH Crew on the nightly news, Jeremy front and center, reigning destruction down on everything in their path.

He feels relaxed and calm for the first time in a really long time. His life is good. He has a job. He has an apartment that _doesn’t_ have roaches. He has his crew. He’s basically got it all.

 

Which is, of course, precisely when it all goes to shit.

\---

It’s a few weeks later when Jeremy stumbles into his apartment, loose-limbed and happy, still grinning from the combination of alcohol and good feeling of being with his crew, and he knows something is wrong almost immediately because his cat is no where to be seen. He’s got his gun out in his hand before he even thinks about it, and is already hitting “2” on his phone’s quick dial function—Ryan is always sober and none of the other guys were even remotely there enough to make it over to help Jeremy if he needed it.

He hits _call_ just as someone grabs him from behind, knocking both things from his hands. He slams his elbow back into the body behind him, and the guy lets out a pained grunt, one of his arms going loose on Jeremy’s upper arms. Jeremy wrenches free, swings again with his elbow and makes contact with the guy’s head, sends him sprawling across the floor of his apartment.

It’s still dark, but Jeremy can see the glow of his cell phone screen glinting off the metal of his gun, so he dives for both. A knee catches him in the stomach and he flies away from his target just as the call connects with Ryan’s phone.

“RYAN—“ he yells, hoping he can convey how fucked he is with one word. The guy who hit him lifts a heel to crush his cell. He faintly hears Ryan’s questioning _Lil J?_ before the phone is smashed into pieces. Jeremy rolls to his feet, fists up like a boxer. “I just fucking bought that, you dick.”

There’s a laugh from behind him and against his better judgment, he turns. He knows that laugh. “Still the same as ever, Jeremy.”

Fuck.

\---

By the time Ryan bursts through the door, Jeremy is bleeding in a few places and tied to a chair. He lifts his head and smiles weakly at his friend. “Hey buddy. What’s up?”

Ryan, ever the worried dad of the group, rushes over and slits the ropes holding Jeremy to the chair with an upset sound. “What the fuck, Jeremy?” He reaches for a particularly bad gash on Jeremy’s cheek but the smaller man brushes him away.

“You’ve seen me looking worse,” Jeremy laughs, but it comes out sounding pained. “Like that time Gavin thought it would be funny to detonate that sticky bomb next to my car? That was way worse.” He starts to stand from the chair but his head goes a little fuzzy and he falls back into with a huff. “ _Damnit_.”

Ryan looks like he doesn’t know whether to collect Jeremy into a blanket and rock him or go out looking for whoever did this and rip their heads from their bodies. He takes a deep breath. “I’ll repeat my question. What. The. Fuck.”

Jeremy tries to stand again, this time he succeeds. “That didn’t sound like a question, Ryan. That was more of a statement.”

“Stop trying to argue semantics with me when I’m trying to restrain myself from picking you up and shaking you until you answer my questions!” Ryan says, his voice getting louder the more frustrated he gets.

“I just—Can we wait?” Jeremy asks. “Like, I’ll tell you but I—I kind of only want to tell this story once if I can help it. Can we wait for the crew to be all together?” He hates how pathetic he sounds but something in Ryan’s face softens and he nods.

“You got a med kit?”

Jeremy laughs, a tired, hollow sound. “Yeah, I’d be crazy not to in this business.”

Ryan doesn’t respond, just follows Jeremy into the bathroom and helps him clean himself up.

\----

“Explain.”

Jeremy winces at the tone in Geoff’s voice. He’s not _mad_ just _disappointed_. It’s the worst tone. He opens his mouth to speak. Hesitates. He doesn’t know _how_ to do this. “I—When I was—“ he feels like he’s going to puke as he stares at his shaking hands. That’s not normal.

“Jeremy.” Gavin’s voice is soft. “Jeremy, look at me, boi.” He puts a gentle hand on Jeremy’s shoulder.

Jeremy looks up.

Gavin’s eyes are staring directly at him. It’s almost too much to have Gavin concentrated so intensely at him. He wants to look away but he knows he couldn’t if he tried. “Gav—“

“It’s okay,” Gavin says. He’s never this serious and it’s throwing Jeremy off. He can handling Gavin being an asshole and making fun of him but he can’t handle this.

“No,” he says finally. “It’s not really. I have to leave Los Santos.”

The whole crew starts to speak at once.

“What—” “Jeremy—“ “That’s bloody stupid—“ “What the fuck—“

He holds up his hands and surprisingly, they all go silent.

“I have to leave. I can’t—there are some people and they came here for me. I have to get out before anyone gets hurt,” he says. He’s proud of the way his voice isn’t shaking and he sounds strong even though to talk about losing this—his crew—is killing him.

Geoff makes a noise. “You’re not leaving,” he says, like it’s law.

“Geoff—“

“I don’t care who’s after you. I honestly don’t give a shit at all,” he interrupts. “Jeremy, if you don’t get that you’re crew by now I’m gonna have to resort to drastic measures.”

“Yeah,” Michael says. “What the fuck, dude? You think we’re just going to let you walk out on us?”

“Not gonna happen,” Jack adds.

“Guys, you don’t understand—“

“Because you won’t tell us!” Gavin says loudly. He sounds upset. It hurts Jeremy more than he thought it would. Silence fills the room and Jeremy can’t take the way they’re all looking at him.

“I—Before I came here, I was—I worked for a guy in Boston. I was part of a crew there…well, not really a crew? More of like, a gang, I guess.” He fidgets with his hands, with the hem of his shirt, anything to keep his hands from shaking. He wants to _run_ because he’s good at that. “No,” he goes on. “That’s not it either. I don’t know why I’m pussy-footing around it.” He looks up at all of them. “You ever heard of the Crowley family?”

Michael eyebrows jump. “You mean the Irish mafia that runs most of Boston?”

“What?!” Geoff cries.

Jeremy struggles with his words. “I—Ever since I was little, I was totally into the idea of the mafia and gangs and crews. For like as long as I can remember. I think it’s because I grew up with all it around me. I actually begged my mom to let me watch _The_ _Godfather_ when I was like, seven.” He half smiles at the memory of his mom saying no, but his uncle sneaking him into a special showing at the old, rundown theater in his neighborhood. “ _The Departed_ came out in what, 2004? I don’t even _like_ movies, but I snuck in to see it when I was 13. My mom kept telling me to cut it out. To stay away from those ideas because she’d had enough friends mixed up in it and it always ended in tears. I couldn’t listen because I _wanted_ so badly to be a part of it all.” He looks at them, one by one.

“Jeremy, that doesn’t really explain why you got the shit kicked out of you and why you have to _leave_ ,” Michael says.

“I’m getting there.” Jeremy stands then, finally trusting his legs enough to pace back and forth while he tries to explain.

“Keep goin’, Lil J,” Gavin says, encouraging.

Jeremy smiles at him briefly. “I got my license when I was 16. I started running small jobs for some low-level guys. I was so small back then,” Ryan snorts out a laugh and Jeremy flips him off. “Smaller than I am now,” he says, sarcasm lacing his tone, “No one ever expected anything from me. I would run drugs, pick up people who needed to be picked up, participate in… _other_ deliveries.” His crappy Ford Taurus probably had as many bodies transported in its trunk as a fucking hearse.

“You were 16?” Geoff sounds pissed off or worried or a combination of both. He’s always been nervous about how young Jeremy is. He’s 24, almost 25 but he looks younger and it’s always been something Geoff has struggled with.

Jeremy shrugs. “Small neighborhood, Boston, lots of ties to organized crime. I needed something to pay for my gas and keep me occupied.”

The room falls silent for a moment only to be broken by Jack. “What happened next?” she asks.

“I kept my head down. Got a reputation for being reliable and a good kid,” Jeremy continues. “There was one night when I was 18, I got this job transporting fighters to and from these underground fighting rings. These guys were _brutal_. Bare-knuckle shit, right? So I’m dropping a guy off and there’s all this commotion inside.” Jeremy pauses in his pacing and he grins.

“Jeremy what—“

“This guy, one of the regular fighters, he didn’t show. I don’t know if he had some excuse or if they took care of him later, but he didn’t show and they needed someone to go into the ring.”

“Jeremy, no,” Gavin breathes.

“Jeremy, yes,” he replies with a laugh. “I was the height I am now, a little thinner, but the same muscle build. They all looked at me like I was crazy when I volunteered.” He turns then; parting his short hair with his fingers and shows them a scar. “This was from that night. I had to get stitches, but the other guy got carried out on a stretcher. I kicked his ass.” He remembers feeling _exhilaration_ after the fight. He stood in the ring to a shocked silence before the place _erupted_ with cheers. He got paid more in that one night than he had even been paid for anything in his life. Jeremy felt _alive_.

“So then what?” Ryan asks.

Jeremy starts pacing again. “So then they called me back every couple of weeks to fight. I got really good. It’s where I learned pretty much everything I know now.”

“Explains why you’re such a brawler,” Geoff mutters. “You’re all heavy hits and shit. No finesse.”

Jeremy chuckles and gives them a one-shoulder shrug. “I didn’t need finesse. I needed to knock the other guy the fuck out.”

“You are built like a brick-shit house,” Michael says. “Didn’t realize you were literally an underground fighter.”

“For an 18-year-old kid, it was just about the best job I could hope for,” Jeremy responds.

“What did your mother say?” Gavin asks quietly. They all turn to look at him and then to Jeremy.

“She, uh, she wasn’t around,” Jeremy says. “She died when I was 17.” He doesn’t say cancer. He doesn’t need to explain, he thinks.

“That blows, dude,” Michael says, but he sounds serious and Jeremy gives him a small smile.

“Yeah, well,” he says, “shit happens.” He doesn’t feel much like saying anything else about it, and thankfully they don’t ask.

“I need a drink before this goes any farther,” Geoff announces. “Pause the story. I don’t want to miss why Lil J thinks he has to skip town.” He stands and saunters slowly into the kitchen. Jeremy hears the fridge door open and a glass _thunk_ loudly on the counter.

“How’s your cheek?”

He looks over at Gavin who is watching him closely. “It’s fine. Had worse before,” he says with a crooked smile.

Gavin doesn’t smile back. “I don’t see why you’re taking this so well,” he says. He folds his arms over his chest, almost like he’s hugging himself. His eyes looks tired, like the alcohol leaving his system is taking all his energy too.

“Gav—“ Jeremy starts. He wants to get that tired, disappointed look out of Gavin’s eyes. He doesn’t want Gavin to look like that at him ever again.

“Alright,” Geoff calls, entering the living room, glass in hand. “I’m sufficiently bevved to finish this story.”

“Where were we?” Jeremy asks. He knows the answer, but he’s trying to lighten the mood.

“We were at the part where you risked your life every night to be a bare-knuckle fighter in an underground ring after your mom died,” Ryan supplies. Jeremy winces. Okay, no mood lightening here today.

“Well, one night Art Crowley came to one of the fights I was in. He was… _impressed_ was the way he put it,” Jeremy says.

“Who is Art Crowley?” Gavin asks.

“Probably the scariest guy on the East Coast,” Michael answers. “I remember hearing about him in the crews I worked with. He was the head of the whole family, right?” He looks to Jeremy who nods.

“He offered me a job.” Jeremy crosses the room and falls next to Jack on the couch. “I couldn’t really say no? I was a kid and he was _The_ Boss.” Jeremy was scared shitless, covered in sweat and blood and sitting in the VIP section of the underground fighting arena. He remembers the smell of expensive cigars and the heat in his stomach from the whiskey he was offered as congratulations for winning his bout.

“What was the job?” Ryan asks. He’s so hard to read sometimes. He looks partly impressed but there’s something else lingering underneath that, a hard sort of emotion that Jeremy can’t seem to put his finger on.

“He asked me what I could do,” Jeremy says quietly. “I told him, for him, I could do _anything_.” Crowley had laughed at that. He’d grunted out something along the lines of ‘ _Like your spirit, kid.’_ And the next thing Jeremy knew, he was in an expensive car with his gym bag being driven back to his shitty apartment.

“Jesus dicks, dude,” Geoff says.

“It wasn’t so bad,” Jeremy explains quickly. “I kind of played body guard to his son, Ben. He was my age, but like, a scrawny, mouthy kid. Kind of like Matt. Saltier than Matt actually,” he laughs as he picks at an old scab on the back of his hand. He wills himself to keep going because this is going to be the first and only time he tells anyone about Ben. “When I was 19, four days after my birthday, I killed a guy.”

“Jeremy,” Jack says. She puts a hand on his arm and squeezes lightly.

“Kind of a late start for someone in out business, right?” he laughs. It sounds tired and he is. So, so tired. “It was dark and the guy came out of nowhere. He said something about Ben’s dad, about Art, and he had a gun. I fought him off and somehow, I got the gun and I didn’t even think twice. I shot three rounds into his chest and one into his head.” Geoff whistles low and Jeremy offers him a weak smile. “Little overkill, I know. I thought he was gonna kill us.”

“You were defending yourself,” Ryan says, like it’s the most obvious thing.

“Yeah,” says Jeremy. “Doesn’t change the fact that I did it.” He spent the night awake in his bed, thinking about what his mother would think of him.

“You kill people all the time.” Michael sounds confused. They all kill people but—

Jeremy sighs. “I don’t _enjoy_ it. It doesn’t give me a rush or anything. There were some guys on Art’s payrole who went out of their way. Like more than Ryan.” Ryan shrugs and tilts his head as if to say, _meh_. “I do it because it’s my part of my job and I love my job.”

“What happened with Ben?” Jack asks. Her hand is still on Jeremy’s arm and it’s kind of a warm, grounding feeling that he appreciates more than he thought he would.

“After that? We were more inseparable than just me working as a bodyguard. He was funny. _Fuck,_ was he funny. He made milk come out my nose once,” Jeremy laughs lightly at the thought, looking down at his lap. “He was my best friend.”

“Jeremy,” Jack says seriously. He looks up at her and he knows there are tears shining in his eyes, which is _why_ he never talks about this. “What happened with Ben?”

Jeremy swallows thickly, avoids the looks from Gavin and Michael because he can’t deal with the pity right now if he wants to get through this. “It was raining,” he says. “We were leaving the arcade down the street from where we were living—we were roommates at this point. Ben wanted—he wanted to play some dumb old arcade game that they had just gotten in and so we went.” Jeremy squeezes his hands together. The pressure on his scrapes and bruises from the thugs in his apartment doing a decent job of grounding him in the moment. “I would have followed him anywhere, honestly.”

“So it was raining. Boston traffic sucks on a good day and it was just starting to get dark. I didn’t—I should have been paying better attention but the next thing I knew, I heard shots and—a car.” He closes his eyes, remembering the moment he’s played over and over in his head for years. He remembers the cool rain on his face and someone yelling something. “There was a car peeling out, it was skidding on the wet road. I—I fell. I didn’t realize why until after.”

“You got shot,” Gavin says. His voice is quiet and sad.

“Yeah,” Jeremy says. “I did. Right in the lower thigh, nothing serious. I didn’t notice; I was yelling for Ben.” He was _screaming_ , searching for his friend. “I found him,” Jeremy whispers. He can’t look at the crew. He clears his throat and speaks up. “He took one to the chest and one to the stomach. I dragged him into an alley, just off the road in case they came back.”

“Jesus.” He’s not sure who says it; it’s said so softly that he can’t tell.

“I couldn’t—there was no way to stop the bleeding and the cops were already on their way so all I could do was just sit with him.” Jeremy recalls apologizing over and over. He had to tell Ben that he was sorry for not being fast enough, strong enough, just _enough_ to stop this from happening.

Ben had reached up, one hand cupping Jeremy’s face and told him it was okay. That he was going to be fine. They’d play another round of Halo when they got back to the apartment and it would all be okay. Jeremy still had Ben’s blood on his face when the police found them huddled in the alley, Ben already gone.

“He, uh,” Jeremy says, wiping quickly at his eyes and trying on a watery smile when he looks up at them. “He didn’t make it.”

“J,” Gavin starts, reaching out for Jeremy. He shrugs off the touch and Gavin pulls back like he was burned.

Jeremy picks at a thread on the couch. “As soon as they left me alone in my hospital room, I ran. Well, I hobbled.” The thread comes loose and he flicks it away. “I ended up here,” he says with his arms outstretched. “I was 19 and dumb and I didn’t think about how it would look to split town after Ben died. Art thinks I had something to do with it. He saw me on the news and came here to find me.”

“What the fuck!” Michael exclaims, an outraged noise leaving his throat. “That’s bullshit!”

“I told him that,” Jeremy laughs hollowly. “Then he hit me across the face with a police baton.” He points to the gash on his cheek.

There’s an awkward silence that follows Jeremy’s declaration.

Geoff sighs. “So what does this prick want?”

“He wants a foothold in Los Santos.”

“Bullshit,” Geoff says. “This is my goddamn city.”

Jeremy hold up his hands, placating. “I know. That’s why he came after me. He wants me to help him take you out. Well he didn’t really ask. It was more of an order.”

“What an asshole,” Michael scoffs.

“I’m at a loss as to why you have to leave, Jeremy.” Gavin is up out of his chair, his nervous energy getting the best of him now that the story is over.

Jeremy stares. “Because he wants me to take you guys out?”

“And? It’s not like you would?”

“That’s true,” Jack says. “I’m missing out on the ‘Lil J leaving’ part of this plan.”

“If I go,” Jeremy says, “If I disappear—he hates me enough that he might come after me. That way, he’s not thinking about here and about taking any of you out. Michael, you know his rep and you know what he can do. I can’t—I won’t let that happen in Los Santos. Not to you guys.”

“Fuck that, Jeremy,” says Michael.

“I agree,” Ryan adds.

“What?”

“Fuck that noise.” Michael gives him a withering look. “Geoff can you believe this guy?”

“Told you he was an idiot when I hired him,” Geoff says, sounding bored.

“Guys—this isn’t—this isn’t your problem. It’s something that followed me and—“

“That’s where you’re wrong, J.” Gavin stops pacing to stare Jeremy down. “It’s absolutely our problem because _you’re_ our problem.”

“We’re with you, buddy,” Michael adds. “Every step of the way.”

“Whether you like it or not,” says Ryan with a smile only a little bit unsettling due to his face paint.

Jeremy is at a loss for words. He had resigned himself to picking up and getting the fuck out of Los Santos because these people and now? Now they’re giving him shit about trying to take care of them.

Geoff crosses his legs and folds his hands in his lap. “You can try to run, Jeremy. I promise you I will personally drag your ass back here kicking and screaming. You belong with your _crew_.” They way he says _crew_ rings out like _family_ and Jeremy feels a lump in his throat.

“Oh,” he says intelligently.

Geoff snorts at that. “Yeah, Dooley. _Oh_. Now, give me the lowdown on this dickweed. We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

**Author's Note:**

> I may continue this. It also may morph into Jerevin because that's where my heart lies at this moment. WE WILL SEE. Would y'all be interested in the show down between the FAHC and the Crowley Family?
> 
> find me on tumblr @scrob-lord


End file.
